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SYDNEY.—CAPE BRETON.—THE OCEAN.

Monday, June 19, 1859. We are still rising and sinking on the misty ocean, and somewhere on those great currents flowing from the Gulf of St. Lawrence.

Yesterday, at an early hour, we were entering Sydney Harbor, Cape Breton, with a tide from sea, and a flood of brightness from the sun. The lively waters, the grassy fields dotted with white dwellings, and the dark green woodlands were bathed in splendor. A few clouds, that might have floated away from the cotton-fields of Alabama, kept Sunday in the quiet heavens. We went ashore with some thought of attending church, but found the time would not permit. A short walk to some Indian huts, with the smoke curling up from their peaks like the pictures of volcanoes, a cup of tea of our own making, some toast and fresh eggs in the village tavern, with the comfort of sitting to enjoy them at a steady table on firm land, gave an agreeable seasoning to the hour we lingered in Sydney, and braced us for the long stretch across to Newfoundland.

As you enter Sydney Bay, you see northward some remarkable cliffs, fan-like in shape as they rise from the sea. In the clear and brilliant morning air, they had a roseate and almost flame-like hue, which made them appear very beautiful. I thought of them as some gigantic sea-shells placed upon the brim of the blue main. When they set in the waves, along in the afternoon, the picturesque coast of Cape Breton was lost to view, and we became, to all appearance, a fixture in the centre of the circle made by the sky and the sea. How wearisome it grew! Always moving forward—yet never getting further from the line behind—never getting nearer to the line before—ever in the centre of the circle. The azure dome was over us, its pearl-colored eaves all around us. Oh! that some power would lift its edge, all dripping with the brine of centuries, out of the ocean, and let the eye peep under! But all is changeless. We were under the centre of the dome, and on the hub of the great wheel, run out upon its long spokes as rapidly and persistently as we would. Our stiff ship was dashing, breast-deep, through the green and purple banks that old Neptune heaved up across our path. Bank after bank he rolled up before us, and our strong bows burst them all, striking foam, snowy foam, out of them by day, and liquid jewelry out of them by night. The circle was still around us, the tip of the dome above. We were leaving half a world of things, and approaching half a world of things, and yet we were that same fixture. Our brave motions, after all, turned out to be a kind of writhing on a point, in the middle of the mighty ring, under the key-stone of the marvellous vault. The comfort of the weary time was, that we sailed away from the morning, passed under the noon, and came up with, and cut through the evening.

When we caught up with the evening yesterday, and saw the sun set fire to, and burn off that everlasting ring, we were sitting quietly on deck, touched with the sweet solemnities of the hallowed hour. The night, with all that it would bring us, was coming out of the east, moving up its stupendous shadow over the ocean; the day, with all it had been to us, was leaving us, going off into the west over the great continent. We were crossing the twilight, that narrow, lonesome, neutral ground, where gloom and splendor interlock and wrestle. The little petrel piped his feeble notes, and flew close up, following under the very feathers of the ship, now skimming the glassy hollow of the swells, and then tiptoe on the crest. The wind was strengthening, tuning every cord and straining every sail, winnowing the fiery chaff, and sowing the sparkling grain forward on the furrowed waters. We had a vessel full of wind; and so vessel, wind and sparks together, went away across the sea as if they were seeking some grand rendezvous. Far and wide the waves all hastened in the same direction, rolling, leaping, crumbling into foam, bristling the snowy feathers on neck and breast as they skipped and flew upon each other in their play and passion. And so we all sped forward with one will, and with one step, keeping time to the music of the mighty band: clouds, winds and billows, seabirds, sails and sparkling smoke, and Merlin with her men; all moving forward, as some grand army moves onward to a battle-field. When there is really nothing to describe, why should not one record the conceits and fancies born of an evening at sea? So I thought, last evening, when I was a little sea-sick, and sick of the monotony of the scene, and a little home-sick, and felt that this was pleasure rather dearly bought. Still if one would see the planet upon which he has taken his passage round the sun, and through the spaces of the universe, he must be brave and patient, hopeful and good-tempered. Be this, or turn back, at the first view of salt-water, and go home to toil, to contentment and self-possession.